MORTALITY FROM CESAREAN SECTION

ABSTRACT

To the Editor:—I am in no way qualified to judge whether Dr. D. L. Smith (The Journal, April 17) is right or wrong in his contention that low cervical cesarean section is preferable to the classic operation; but any one accustomed to weighing evidence may quarrel with his statement of the case. His table 2, for example, reports a total of three deaths out of 100 patients subjected to the low cervical operation and eight deaths out of 180 treated in the classic manner. Application of an elementary test (chi square for a fourfold table) shows that the apparent difference between these mortality ratios might very easily arise by chance alone. The apparent improvement, in the same table, from 1934 to 1935 is equally devoid of significance. Nor do I think one should speak of a 331/3 per cent mortality in a group of six cases and compare this

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